The Economic and Community Development Committee (ECDC), which I chair, will meet next Tuesday and we're in for some lively debate. We have a number of meaty items on the agenda, which I want to break down for you today. Let's take a look.
HOLD THE CHICKENS
If you've been watching the news, you may have heard something about backyard chickens here in Toronto. Since 2018, the City has been running the UrbanHensTO Pilot Program, which has allowed residents in select city wards to keep hens.
Having backyard hens is work. It takes real commitment and maintenance. For that reason, allowing them in Toronto went quite smoothly. Only about 100 households participated in the pilot. Due to the level of care involved, homeowners often sign up for one spring/summer season but don't return to the program the following year.
The pilot has been quite successful, but City Staff do not recommend extending the program city-wide at this time. Given the current risk of Avian Flu, we are winding down the program. Current participants will be allowed to keep their hens until the end of the animals' lives. When the risk of flu has passed, a city-wide permission would be manageable and it might be a discussion to revisit.
ENHANCING OUR WARMING CENTRE MODEL
This year, there was a big focus on our warming centres and what our city can do to offer more safe, indoor spaces to those experiencing homelessness in our harshest season. ECDC asked Shelter, Support & Housing Administration (SSHA) staff to prepare a full report on how we can improve this model, and how we might be able to run our warming centres 24/7. We know that we can and should do more with our winter strategy, and this report outlines just how to do that.
This week, I announced the proposed changes to our warming centre model. The report coming to Committee next week includes lessons learned from the 24/7 pilot and shows us what would be required to provide more access this coming winter. With just $5 million from our partner orders of government, we could operate two warming centres 24/7 and run additional temporary services for much of the winter. The report also recommends raising the temperature at which we open the temporary sites. If we adopt these recommendations, warming centres will open when temperatures reach -5°C, up from -15°C, and whenever Environment Canada issues an extreme weather warning.
However, we cannot fully implement this plan alone. Serving the homeless is wealth redistribution in its purest form, and property taxes are not structured to do that. Property taxes are not collected based on your wealth—income taxes are. That is why this report calls on the Federal and Provincial governments to help fund our expanded winter strategy. I trust that our partners at both levels of government see the urgency of this work and will provide the support necessary for our city to achieve these goals.
CHANGES TO THE EMPLOYMENT OFFICE
Getting the unemployed and under-employed through the right doors and into sustainable employment is absolutely key to our city's health. Toronto Employment and Social Services (TESS) has, since amalgamation, been connecting people with employers and employee training. TESS includes several social services under one banner because it helps connect those to the wide range of supports they need to find successful work. For those that need them, TESS provides pre-employment capacity-building programs. Rather than send clients to job interviews endlessly with no success, TESS refers clients to partner agencies and programs that get people ready to be successful at finding and keeping a job.
One of our TESS centres. All of that is about to change. Premier Ford is uploading the management social and employment services to the Provincial government. Under this new model, employment services will look quite different. The Province will contract a provider of these services in each municipality and set strict criteria around how the program should be run. For clients in Toronto, this will feel like a deep cut. The Provincial model does not include the pre-employment services we've been delivering for decades.
The item coming to ECDC on this will be quite an eye-opener for Council members. City staff first informed Council about these changes when they were announced by the Province in 2021, and we were comforted by the news that Toronto would be near the end of the list. This gave staff lots of time to make their case to the Province for continuing our long-successful approach to getting challenging clients employed.
Since 2021, staff have been following the changes in other municipalities. They've noticed that the Province is being very prescriptive—some might even say rigid—in their approach. They leave no grey area for additional service, even if it might lead to successful employment for another Torontonian. City staff explored presenting a bid to become the contractor that delivers employment services in Toronto, but found that we would not be funded to deliver the kind of service we have in past. Instead, City staff recommend letting the Province choose a contractor, who we will work with to build additional programs that lead to true workforce development.
THE HONOUR IS ALL MINE
Last but not least, I want to highlight that while ECDC deals with some very serious and very human issues, we sometimes get rewarded with very special moments. One such moment is coming on Tuesday, when we welcome Lillian Allen to be named our latest Toronto Poet Laureate.
Lillian Allen, our next Poet Laureate. I can honestly say that Lillian was instrumental in forming some of my politics and my feminism. In my twenties, my husband and I were all about enjoying the city before settling down and having a family. We spent many nights at the Bamboo Club and other venues in and around Queen Street, where Lillian would show up and riff her unique brand of Dub Poetry with the musicians on stage.
She spoke about what it could mean to be a woman in this city if you weren't born with privilege—what it would feel like to be a powerless social worker or the even more powerless client before them. She spoke of the pain of childbirth, and then that the pushing continues as a mother has to give birth to the life that baby will lead.
Toronto's next Poet Laureate, Lillian Allen, fills up everyone who listens to her. My thanks to the panel who have brought her forward to inhabit this role.
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